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Writers, have you ever done NaNoWriMo or National Novel Writing Month? A lot of us have. The rule is to try to write a 50000 word novel in November. Some of the problems are that you are discouraged from planning your NaNo novel for more than a week before the start of November, so some writers get stuck. Others of us come to regard the NaNo rules as suggestions, and I’m one of them.

I’ve been planning my NaNo story for several years now, and the roots of the story go even deeper into my past. I’m not planning to write 50000 words in November. I do want to write about a chapter a day, but my chapters are shorter than the word count that would lead to 50000 words in a month. And I’m posting my chapters on Wattpad.

Which is kind of risky. Wattpad is full of young fanfic writers who lack a lot of the knowledge I had at age 15. If they read your work it may be to get you to read theirs, which might well be unreadable. And if I were over-sensitive to any criticism, I would not dare use Wattpad because I have seen people put very ignorant criticisms on Wattpad works other than my own. And finally, many Wattpad readers expect to read free stuff. They are not going to be buying your book or ebook at any point.

I’m using Wattpad mainly to keep me motivated. If I can pretend I have other human beings waiting for my next chapter, then I may be more likely to write that next chapter. I have a lot of problems finishing work, in part due to the social isolation that so many writers have. Most of us work alone, and no one encourages us that has actually seen our work-in-progress. One can kind of envy writers like Tabitha King, whose husband is also a writer of some sort.

My NaNo novel is starship based science fiction, with a plot inspired from one or more Star Trek movies— a starship full of cadets has to go into real-world action as a result of an emergency. In my story, there are fewer full-adult officers and crew, and in addition to the cadets, there are a lot of refugees who entered the starship while it was parked on a planet to take shelter from an attack. If you are curious, view chapter one here: https://www.wattpad.com/643568763-flight-of-the-starship-destine-chapter-1

So: are you doing NaNo this year? What is your story about? Do you have any good strategies for NaNo?

Being a writer starts out with having fantasies— making up stories in your head. At first, we do it for our own amusement. It’s only later that we decide to write down some of our fantasies and become Real Writers.

The biggest influence on my early making-up-stories was the original Star Trek series. As a kid, I often went on long walks through my neighborhood or a nearby woods, making up a Star Trek story all the time. Of course, these stories were silly. If I had written any down, they would be embarrassing. Kids’ fantasies are like that.

Since I was a big Star Trek fan, I watched the episodes over and over, and internalized the rules of that particular science fiction universe. I loyally ignored the weird, contradictory stuff- like the fact that the Enterprise had an actual chapel but no chaplain or even visiting priests, pastors or rabbis. Over the years of making up stories, my Star Trek stories became better. Though they also became less like the Official Star Trek canon and more like what I wished Star Trek was like.

At a certain point in my later childhood, I decided I was a general science fiction fan and tried to read other science fiction. Didn’t always have luck finding stuff I liked. I remember one story where a space traveller discovered that the Star of Bethlehem was a supernova that destroyed an inhabited planetary system. And then there was The Cold Equations, where the stowaway girl-character I thought of as the main character has to be killed to save other lives.

I eventually discovered stories I did like. Some, like the Darkover series by She Who Must Not Be Named, I can no longer bear to read when I discovered unpleasant realities about the author in a book written by her daughter, Moira Greyland. So I had to find other authors. Like Declan Finn, Karina Fabian, Daniella Bova and Jill Williamson.

But my mental Star Trek stories have persisted all these years. I used to have plans to write one of those Star Trek novels from Pocket Books. I used to read and collect them compulsively. But for a few years I didn’t buy new ones due to a bookstore shortage in my area. I recently bought a new Star Trek novel and saw that the series had been utterly ruined. The novel showed what should have been an exciting action sequence. But a character was wasting time worrying about what pronoun she should use while THINKING about unisexual aliens— she chose a newly invented ‘alternative’ pronoun. I chose not to waste my money on such drivel again. Real action heroes don’t waste time worrying about THINKING the wrong thing.

Since I’ve been aware for years that my mental stories now contain a lot of original content— persistent characters who never appear in Star Trek, an interplanetary system that’s nothing like the United Federation of Planets, a space fleet that is not taxpayer supported but has to support itself by hauling trade goods from planet to planet….. I’ve been working for some years on creating an original setting and character group that I can use as a replacement for my unoriginal Star Trek stuff so I can write an original space opera novel or series.

I think that many of use writers are working through something similar. We have long connections to other people’s fiction that stimulates our own creative side. And then we must cut the cord and create something original to take its place, We have to think about what it is about those other people’s fiction that inspires us, and what parts we don’t like so much or that we could replace with something we like better. And then we have to take that flood of ideas we have and make them consistent. For example, if Christians are widely persecuted in your universe, you can’t have Christian leaders wielding great power without explanation. Perhaps you can have persecution in most places and Christians-with-power in others.

The thing to remember is that your writing is first about YOU. What you like, what stimulates your imagination to produce ever-more ideas. You have to shape your ideas so that there are at least some groups of readers who can enjoy your work, but you shouldn’t be writing stuff you can’t stand. You probably can’t do that over the long term, and even if you can, you won’t enjoy it.

Freedom of speech. A lot of people don’t really believe in it any more. They want their social media cleared of ‘hate speech’— which often includes conservative speech, and quoting Bible verses about homosexuality. But social media can’t afford to have a human evaluator (censor) read through every potential post before it gets actually posted. And so many criminals like the synagogue shooter have Twitter accounts, and for some reason in spite of Twitter’s anti-hate policy he got to stay there— where some of my conservative friends got suspended or banned.

If you have heard media reports about the social media Gab, you have probably been lied to. Gab is not a racist/antisemite haven— I’ve SEEN sites that are racist/antisemite havens when I was researching extremists for a writing project. Gab is a FREE SPEECH oriented social media. I got on it when some conservative-libertarian writer friends of mine recommended it. On Gab I have seen antisemites, but I have also seen Jewish people and pro-Israel people. I have seen ‘racialists’ [actual racists who admit they are racist] and liberals and members of the US Republican party— the party that freed the Black slaves. I’ve seen smutty naked posts and devout Christian clean posts. That’s what FREE SPEECH is about— people are free to speak their OWN minds, not just reflect what other people think is right.

NOW: I am sure there are some of you who presume that I am racist, antisemitic or ‘ALT-RIGHT’ myself. I don’t like to hear racialist speech because I have Ottawa Indian ancestry and I wouldn’t be pure enough for that type. As a Christian, I don’t care for antisemitic remarks because my personal Lord and Savior is a Jewish dude! As for ALT-RIGHT, the few people I know who use that as a self-description don’t mean it the way the media does. I’d need way more information before I personally would demonize the ALT-RIGHT. And as for the real bad guys like Neo-Nazis— will taking away their FREE SPEECH make them into nicer people? Are they better off only speaking their mind in secret, hidden Nazi forums? Or will they become better people if they are free to interact with the rest of us? I despise most of what such people say, but as the saying goes, I will defend to my death their FREE SPEECH rights to say it.

Muting and Blocking

How do you use a FREE SPEECH social media like Gab? The first thing is to learn how to mute or block other users. Gab makes it easy. I routinely block people who mostly post photos of private parts. I don’t necessarily bother to block all Neo-Nazis. If they are in the Gab topics or groups I use, I may well correct the things they say! On a Christian Gab topic, an antisemite blamed ‘the Jews’ for the martyrdom of the Apostles. I pointed out that Jesus and his Apostles WERE Jewish people, and that early martyrs got persecuted by the Romans as well as local Jewish authorities. Gab went down temporarily not long after I posted that so I don’t know if he responded. If he persistently annoyed me, I would have blocked.

I know that a lot of us are scared of the consequences of free speech. We get told in the media daily that wrongspeech causes ‘hate crimes.’ But they aren’t too worried when left-wing media personalities literally call for the assassination of the current US president! It’s only wrongspeech that won’t vote for them that worries them. The fact is that unless there is FREE SPEECH, none of us is safe. Facebook and Twitter, social media which are known for taking down alleged hate, takes down a lot of innocent conservative and Christian posts, but if you are conservative and someone on Facebook tells you essentially to eat sh-t and die, and steals your profile picture to do it, Facebook won’t do dick about it. I have a conservative FB page about man-woman marriage, and I’ve been told I’m crazy, a liar, a fraud, and that my (now dead) disabled kitten was ugly— with a lot of dirty words mixed in to the insults. I really think the only reason that page hasn’t been taken down yet is that I admit I have same-sex attraction (‘gay’ or ‘ex-gay’ identity) and though I also admit I’m chaste, I might still be a protected ‘minority’ and that protects me from FB persecution.

The lesson of the Gab takedown is that we need to defend FREE SPEECH, and we need to protect those social media that don’t ban alleged ‘haters’ and that really allow free speech. If you want a social media presence, as writers and bloggers need to survive these days, you need multiple social media. Any social media could arbitrarily ban you, any social media that advocates for FREE SPEECH can be taken down overnight. You need a backup, and, yeah, that means more social media work. But we can’t afford to put all our social media eggs in one basket.

Currently, Gab is still transitioning to a new hosting provider after widespread attacks on that social media. Twitter, however, is not under immediate threat in spite of the fact that the synagogue shooter had a Twitter account. The Gab service does still have a Twitter account, so you can follow that account to be updated as to when Gab gets up again. It’s also an opportunity to get Gab’s point of view unfiltered by the biases of the news media.

I recommend that once Gab gets back up, you prayerfully consider starting an account there, just to show your belief in FREE SPEECH. If you do believe in it. You don’t have to actively use Gab a lot. Just try it. Get to know the reality of it. It does not have the wide user base of the censorship media like Facebook and Twitter, but it does have a band of very loyal users. Once Gab is back up, I plan to research an article on how to use Gab more effectively.

Don’t you just hate propaganda terms like ‘marriage equality’ and ‘the Jewish problem?’ It’s just a way to hide what you are really talking about— eliminating marriage or eliminating Jews, in those cases.

The campaign to replace marriage with ‘marriage equality’ doesn’t like to mention the fact that it will require essentially closing down all Bible-believing churches (and synagogues) lest they read ‘hate speech’ off the pages of the Bible. I honestly believe that many of the Left-wing politicians preaching ‘marriage equality’ don’t give a fig for gay people. They just want to shut down their rival for power— the Church.

A new generation is growing up that hasn’t learned the teachings of the Church or of the Bible. They preach odd stuff like the idea that if Jesus didn’t personally say ‘No Gay marriage’ then the fact that the Bible speaks out against homosexual behaviors and lusts does not count. Here is what Jesus has to say about that bad theology: “Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil.” Matthew 5:17 KJV

Here are some verses to consider when making up your mind whether to conform to progressive ideology on #MarriageEquality:

“For this cause God gave them up unto vile affections; for even their women did change the natural use into that which is against nature: And likewise the men, leaving the natural use of the woman, burned in their lust one toward another; men with men working that which is unseemly, and receiving in themselves that recompense of their error which was meet. And even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a reprobate mind, to do those things which are not convenient.” Romans 1: 26-28 KJV

If we conform to the world and accept same-sex marriage, rejecting God’s word, will we be given over to a ‘reprobate mind?’

“Even as Sodom and Gomorrha, and the cities about them in like manner, giving themselves over to fornication, and going after strange flesh, are set forth for an example, suffering the vengeance of eternal fire.” Jude 1:7 KJV

The world calls sins of the flesh ‘sexual liberation,’ but God takes such sins seriously.

“Knowing this, that the law is not made for a righteous man, but for the lawless and disobedient, for the ungodly and for sinners, for unholy and profane, for murderers of fathers and murderers of mothers, for manslayers, For whoremongers, for them that defile themselves with mankind, for menstealers, for liars, for perjured persons, and if there be any other thing that is contrary to sound doctrine.” 1 Timothy 1:9-10 KJV

Christ died for us while we were yet sinners, but we are not called to live in our sins. Murders, unchastity, homosexuality and lying are not a part of a Christian life.

“Nevertheless, to avoid fornication, let every man have his own wife, and let every woman have her own husband.” 1 Cor. 7:2 KJV

Fornication is a sexual sin which includes any sexual act outside of a valid man-woman marriage. Homosexual relations and heterosexual adultery are both forbidden.

“Know yet not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Be not deceived: neither fornicators, nor idolators, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners, shall inherit the kingdom of God. And such were some of you: but ye are washed, but ye are sanctified, but ye are justified in the name of the Lord Jesus, and by the spirit of our God.” 1 Corinthians 6:9-11 KJV

Effeminate (Strong’s #3120, Greek) means effeminate, soft, a catamite. A man who dressed as a woman to lure men into homosexual behavior. Roman culture distinguished between the effeminate man who took the woman’s role in sex, and the ‘manly’ man who took the masculine role in homosexual sex, and who was not considered a homosexual person. The Bible condemns both types of homosexual behaviour along with fornication drunkenness, theft and other sins. And it says ‘such were some of you!’ So it means people with gay/homosexual attractions, even with a long history of gay sex, can be saved if they repent, just like the drunks and the thieves can be saved if they repent.

“Thou shalt not lie with mankind, as with womankind, it is abomination.” Leviticus 18:22

It does not say that it is wrong to ‘be’ homosexual or to be tempted by homosexual relationships. It’s all about what you do. God understands that some of us are tempted by same-sex relationships.

“If a man also lie with mankind, as he lieth with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination: they shall surely be put to death; their blood shall be upon them.” Leviticus 20:13

This seems harsh, but God in Leviticus was teaching the people the way to be holy. God teaches us right from wrong, but when Man sins, God comes to earth as Jesus Christ to die on the Cross so we don’t have to suffer eternal death for our sins. Praise the Lord!

NOTE: if you feel you are ‘Gay’ or are troubled by attractions to persons of the same-sex, you are not condemned by God for those feelings! Look at 1 Corinthians 11— And such were some of you. You can overcome Gay feelings and be forgiven for Gay-related sins. The Church has a ministry, Courage International, to help people with Same-Sex Attraction (SSA) deal with this issue. I have Same-Sex Attraction myself (I don’t use the terms Gay or Lesbian any more since Courage Int. discourages it) and the people I met through the Courage FB group have helped me have hope. Jesus never gave up on me when I was a Lesbian looking for love, when I gave up on Christianity and became a neopagan for years. He still brought me back to reality and to the Catholic Church (I was raised Protestant.) God is Good!

SECOND NOTE: If you tweet these Bible verses you might get banned from Twitter. I’m tweeting them anyway, but I’m on Gab and MeWe as well so I can’t get wholly shut down. I hope.

What is MeWe, anyway? It’s a new social media which is an alternative to Facebook and Twitter. Why do people even want that? Because Facebook and Twitter are run by people who find it weird and suspicious when people don’t share their viewpoint and their politics.

I’ve known a lot of conservative and Christian people who have been unfairly banned or suspended by Facebook or Twitter. Often it’s for some minor thing. Or they never tell you why you are in trouble at all. I’ve heard of one FB user who even got his post deleted because he mentioned he was on MeWe and used the hashtag #MeWe.

On the other hand, what happens if you are conservative or Christian on FB and someone bullies you? I had some left-wingers steal my picture from my pro-traditional-marriage page, and use it for a post on their FB page which essentially told me to eat sh-t and die. I reported that FB page, which did nothing but personally harass conservatives. Nothing got done about it.

Now, I know a lot of people get tired of being told that they have to be on different social media. But when your social media is failing you, and you may lose your account unfairly, you need an alternative and you need to get started NOW, and not wait until you are in trouble with Facebook just when your new book comes out, or when you have a great blog post that needs promoting.

Starting Your Account

Open an account on MeWe. You will need a profile picture and a cover photo, just like for setting up on Facebook or Twitter. I used the same ones as I use for Facebook. I use my name: nissaannakindt as my ID there. If you are a writer and trying to gain a platform, use your author name, real or pen name. Use a profile picture of your actual face. On the other hand, if you are a blogger and advocate for your point-of-view under a patently false name (‘The Deplorable Guy’ or ‘Socialist Nancy P.’ or whatever) use that name. Whatever name you need to build a platform for.

Once you have an account, you will need contacts: that is, friends or followers on the site. How do you get contacts? You recruit them from the people you already know from FB and Twitter. Take these steps to get started with contacts:

Use your list of email addresses. Send an email to your email-connected friends and invite them over to MeWe.

Tweet about it! Tell your Twitter followers you are on MeWe and why, and give the link to your profile page on MeWe. Use the hashtag #MeWe when you do this. Do it more than once.

Tell your Facebook friends about it. DON’T use the hashtag #MeWe on FB because they do take posts down for that ‘sin.’ If you have other pages on Facebook, make a post about MeWe there as well. Again, make posts like this more than once.

Add your MeWe profile’s link to your pages on various social media and to your blog or web page.

Write a blog post about MeWe— whatever aspect of MeWe you like. Include a link to your profile page on MeWe and invite your readers to become your contacts.

Become active on MeWe: when you write a blog post, share it on MeWe. Post pictures of your cats on MeWe. Check your MeWe page regularly like you do your FB and Twitter. Comment on stuff. Don’t be quick to give up on MeWe because you don’t know many people there yet. It takes time.

Set Goals!At first, when you start out, make your goal getting 10 new contacts. Then 20, 30 and so on. It’s like on FB and Twitter— you need to make ‘friends’ on the new site or you are just talking to yourself.

Now, don’t expect all of your friends to jump on the MeWe bandwagon and join you there! Be low-key about it. They may find their own reasons to join in a few weeks or months. In fact, spending time on MeWe may be a bit of a gamble for you. It may be the coming thing, and it may not.

The important thing for the blogger or writer who wants to use social media to build a platform is to avoid being in the FB/Twitter rut. You need more social media than just those two! And if you are at risk for ‘offending’ the gods of Facebook or Twitter by failing to conform to Left-wing political agendas, you may someday really need to be on alternative social media.

Feel free to request to become my contact on MeWe. I will accept requests so long as they are not from porn-filled accounts. I will be your guide— or maybe you will be mine— through the unexplored wilderness of MeWe. This is my profile page: mewe.com/i/nissaannakindt

If you are connected with the prolife movement online, you hear these stories all the time. But you know what I never hear? I’ve never heard a single story where a woman or girl has died from a botched adoption.

Adoption is the unspeakable option to the point that when people are advocating for the kill-babies-by-abortion movement, they never mention that option. It’s either abort right now for a big fee at our Planned Parenthood clinic, or have the baby and quit school and be a single mom. What happened to the adoption option?

Adoption is the safe option. Why don’t we speak about this? Having an abortion is like smoking a cigarette (tobacco or other,) mainlining heroin, or eating sugar right from the bag by the tablespoonful. It’s a health risk we don’t have to take!

It’s a win-win situation. You get a loving home for your baby, you get to finish school and live your life, and you have the option of making yourself available when the kid grows up and having a relationship with the kid. And you don’t have to change a single diaper!

It’s becoming clearer to me that the feminism/pro-abort movement isn’t about helping women, it’s about making money for abortion clinic chains like Planned Parenthood. Because if you cared about the actual women/girls and their physical and mental health, you would at least not ban mention of the adoption possibility.

OK, maybe I’m just weird. But I hate being expected to be a feminist and love feminism just because I have female genitals. I mean, are guys expected to be ‘masculinists’ and vote for male candidates when they hate those candidates’ policies? Unfair!

On Twitter, I used the #womenagainstfeminism hashtag once, and boy did that unleash the trolls. One woman roared that women like me ought not be allowed to vote. Sorry, I’m going to keep my vote– and I thought feminists were in favor of votes for women. But maybe they want to limit that to FEMINIST women— so women will not have equality unless they support the full feminist bill of goods, including abortion and including biological males calling themselves ‘transgender’ and being allowed to compete in women’s sports. (If ‘transgender’ men can’t compete with other men in sports, maybe they should have a sports classification for themselves. Because some biological women want to have women’s sports for some reason.)

I don’t understand people like that. If I disagree with people on Twitter I usually ignore them or unfollow them. Once in a great while I do express an opinion, but I try to be polite. Except when I’m dealing with a bullying ‘athiest’ I do correct spelling!

If you are on Twitter and you want attention, do try the hashtag #womenagainstfeminism . It ticks off all the right (Left?) people!

Nissa Annakindt: Poet, Aspie & cat person

I share what I know— be warned! My opinions on politics and religion are loudly proclaimed here from time to time. (‘Deplorable’ & Catholic, respectively. I also have Same-Sex Attraction, which I handle with chastity.)

I welcome civil comments but can’t always reply as I’m over-busy & also because I have an autism spectrum disorder and social interaction’s not what I’m good at.

Nissa Annakindt

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